Articles & Op-Eds

Support from his own party in doubt, President Barack Obama summoned more than a dozen House Democrats to the White House Thursday, pleading with them to put aside their qualms, seize a historic moment and vote for his massive health care overhaul.

President Obama's endorsement Wednesday of a risky legislative maneuver to complete health-care legislation sent Democratic leaders scrambling to settle policy disputes and assemble the votes necessary for passage in the coming weeks.

As Democrats on Capitol Hill prepared a risky effort to muscle sweeping health-care legislation to final passage, President Obama on Tuesday made a last gambit to split Republicans on the issue, proposing to incorporate a handful of GOP ideas into his signature domestic initiative.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) is using Sen. Jim Bunning’s (R-Ky.) one-man filibuster of a package to extend unemployment and health benefits and highway programs to renew his argument that the Senate needs to change the way it does business.

Raising the prospect of a "simple up-or-down vote" on health-care reform, White House adviser Nancy-Ann DeParle said on Sunday she thinks Democrats will secure enough ayes on the measure and signaled that the administration could be moving toward trying to pass it along party lines.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) warned Monday afternoon that debt crises like the one gripping Greece will inevitably hit the United States if leaders fail to cut deficits, and he urged Republicans to join President Barack Obama’s fiscal commission and develop a package of budget cuts and revenue hikes by the end of the year.

If there was any question about how deeply divided Republicans and Democrats are about how to reshape the American health care system, consider that they spent the first few hours of President Obama’s much-anticipated health care forum on Thursday arguing over whether they were in fact deeply divided.

President Obama made it clear Monday morning that he intends to make a final push for a comprehensive overhaul of the nation's health-care and insurance system, offering a new health-care plan that largely embraces the approach already taken by the U.S. Senate.

House Democrats were eyeing the history books in November when they voted for a sweeping health care overhaul that carried the name of the chamber’s longest-serving member, Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.).

House Democratic leaders sent mixed signals Friday on a new jobs bill supported by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and a senior Republican senator predicted his party will block action on the Senate floor.

President Obama brought Republicans to the negotiating table on Tuesday, hoping to stem a steady deterioration in relations between the two parties that has brought business in Washington to a standstill, left the Democratic agenda in tatters and angered voters who are eager to have lawmakers address their concerns.

President Barack Obama, seeking to give new momentum to his languishing health-care legislation, said he would sit down with Republican and Democratic lawmakers to exchange ideas on an issue that has deeply divided the parties.

Congress agreed Thursday to revive the pay-as-you-go budget rules that helped wipe out massive deficits and balance the budget during the Clinton administration, although the new version includes a long list of exceptions that would permit Democrats to add at least $1.5 trillion to the nation's tab over the next decade.

President Obama urged congressional Democrats on Wednesday "to finish the job on health care," but amid tentative signs of bipartisan outreach on Capitol Hill, he suggested that Republicans could be enlisted to play at least some role in negotiating a final bill.

Moderate House Democrats may be able to vote Thursday for the statutory pay-as-you-go budget enforcement tool they have long sought without having to vote directly on an accompanying $1.9 trillion debt limit increase.

House and Senate leaders said separately Tuesday that they hope to find a way to revive a health-care overhaul bill, even though the situation looks bleak with the recent loss of the Senate's filibuster-proof majority.